by Helena Halme
‘Did you know that they have no loos there, and do both their number ones and twos in the forest?’ Pammy had said when Kaisa had driven her to the base one time. She shivered when she thought about living like that. As she waited in her car for the protest to end, thinking that the protestors ought to be more afraid of the Navy personnel, and not the other way around, there was a knock on her window. The pregnant girl was standing there, with the slight drizzle falling onto her matted, short blonde hair. ‘Sorry we’re holding you up,’ she said and grinned.
‘That’s alright, I’m not in a hurry.’
‘We don’t really like doing this, but it’s in the camp rules.’ The girl glanced over to one of the men whose expression seemed hostile.
‘What do you mean?’
The drizzle had become heavier, and it now looked more like sleet. Kaisa hoped there’d be snow soon. But the girl looked very cold so, surprising herself, Kaisa said, ‘Why don’t you come inside the car to warm up a bit.’
The girl looked at the group in the middle of the road and, touching her round belly, which was covered with her long, colourful poncho, she swiftly walked around the car, opened the door and sat next to Kaisa. ‘Lyn,’ she said and offered Kaisa her hand. Kaisa tried to place her accent but couldn’t.
‘I’m Kaisa. Where are you from?’ Kaisa added. Lyn’s hand was ice-cold.
‘Leeds,’ Lyn said and began warming her fingers by rubbing them against the heater in the car.
‘You’re frozen,’ Kaisa said.
Lyn just grinned at her as if to say, ‘I know’. Kaisa glanced at the old caravans on the side of the road, which made up the camp. There were a few faded tarpaulins fixed across the vehicles. ‘It must be difficult to stay there all year round when it’s so cold and damp,’ she said.
‘It’s alright. We light fires most days and the caravans have heaters. The only problem is drying the clothes. Oh, and this. I’m not sure if we’ll have enough hot water when it’s my time.’ Lyn put both of her hands around her belly. ‘Oh, he’s kicking; do you want to feel?’
Kaisa looked at Lyn’s belly, which stretched the fabric of her trousers to its limit. She was about to say, ‘No, thank you,’ when Lyn took hold of Kaisa’s hand and placed it on the lower part of her round tummy. Through her hands Kaisa could feel slight movements, and then a sharp kick, which nearly propelled her hand away from the tummy. Kaisa looked at Lyn, whose smile had grown wider, ‘It’s quite amazing, isn’t it?’
Kaisa was speechless. She kept her hand on Lyn’s belly in the hope that there’d be another wonderful kick, but the baby was still. ‘Thank you,’ Kaisa said quietly. She felt humbled by what this unknown girl had shared with her. Kaisa looked into Lyn’s dark-green eyes. Kaisa noticed now that Lyn was very beautiful in spite of her clothes and the short hair that stuck out in all directions. It was her eyes that did it; they were clear and had a glow to them. The two women sat there, inside the car, silently smiling at each other when suddenly the noise outside became louder. They both looked ahead out of the misted-up windscreen. Lyn pulled the sleeve of her jumper up to her hand and wiped the window clean. The small group of women and men were shouting, ‘Lyn, come on!’ and waving in their direction. They’d rolled the sheet together and were standing by the side of the road.
‘I’m off,’ Lyn said and leaned over as much as she could to give Kaisa a kiss on the cheek.
Twenty-Six
When Kaisa drove down to the base the next day for her daily swim, she tried to see Lyn, but it was raining so hard that there wasn’t anybody sitting outside. There were just faint lights in the windows of the run-down caravans, showing that there was someone at home.
After her swim, Kaisa decided to drive into Helensburgh to post a note she’d written to Pammy. She didn’t want to intrude on her grief over the lost baby, especially as her mother was with her, but she thought a note might be a good idea. Peter would be proud of her English manners. The thought of Peter gave her a hollow feeling in her tummy, but she tried to ignore it and instead began thinking about what a pregnant mother would need. After the Post Office, she went into the little supermarket and got a pint of milk, some bread and some greens, which Peter’s mum cooked to go with her Sunday roasts, carrots and some red lentils, which Kaisa found at the back of the shop. She guessed Lyn would be vegetarian, so she didn’t buy any meat or eggs. On a whim, Kaisa also bought a variety of chocolate bars, which the shop displayed on the counter. ‘For the kiddies, eh?’ the shop owner said. Kaisa just nodded and braced herself for the short walk to the car. It was raining again, and there was a bitter wind blowing, which made it impossible to defend yourself against the heavy drops. The town looked deserted, with only a few men waiting outside The Henry Bell pub. Kaisa looked at her watch; it was a few minutes to twelve, and almost opening time.
The rain was still falling and the wind blowing when Kaisa reached the camp. She parked on the road and, carrying the two bags of shopping, made her way carefully towards the first of the caravans. The ground was wet and muddy and Kaisa cursed herself for not wearing a pair of wellies.
Kaisa could hear laughter from inside when she knocked. Trying to be heard above the sound of the falling rain, she shouted, ‘Hello!’ There was no reaction. Kaisa’s flimsy tennis shoes were caked in mud and her jeans were wet and stuck to the skin from the dripping rain, which now also ran down Kaisa’s waxed jacket. Whoever thought that a Barbour was a useful piece of clothing in Scotland, she’d never know. It was favoured by all the Navy wives, and Kaisa had fallen into the trap of thinking it must be perfect for the Scottish climate. But no, the jacket was either insufficiently warm on a cold and rainy day like today, or too hot when temperatures were mild.
Kaisa knocked again and almost immediately the door was flung open and the guy who’d been leading the marches two days previously, surveyed her. His eyes were dark and he was wearing a loosely knitted jumper with faded jeans. He was barefoot and Kaisa averted her eyes from the sight of his dirty toes. Lyn was sitting next to a younger, very slim girl with bright purple hair.
‘Hi,’ Lyn said, ‘come in!’
The guy, still looking intently at Kaisa, took one step sideways, and she squeezed past him.
‘It’s bloody pissing out there again, isn’t it!’ Lyn said and laughed with the girl next to her. The curse startled her, but Kaisa was drenched, and glad to step inside the warmth of the caravan. ‘I bought some stuff …’ she said.
The guy snatched the bag from her.
‘Gerry, for fuck’s sake!’ Lyn shouted and, with difficulty, heaved herself up from the little couch. ‘Thank you,’ she said as she peered into the shopping bag. ‘I love chocolate,’ she said and came over and gave Kaisa a kiss on the cheek. ‘Take your coat off,’ she said and, looking at her soaked shoes, added, ‘and you’d better take your shoes off too and put them next to the wood burner.’
While Kaisa struggled to take her shoes and coat off in the small space without knocking into either Lyn’s belly or stepping onto Gerry’s hairy toes, Gerry himself was digging into the bag, ‘We’re not a bloody charity, you know that don’t you?’ He took out a Lion bar and bit into it. Crumbs of chocolate fell onto his blond, shaggy beard.
Kaisa didn’t know what to say, or do, and just stood there, in the middle of the caravan, slowly thawing out. The wood burner gave the room a familiar, almost sauna-like smell. The couch where Lyn and her friend were sitting, Kaisa now saw, was a bed. At the end of the space was a tiny kitchen, filled with pots and pans, and a small table with two chairs either side. Gerry sat down on one of the chairs and, having nowhere else, Kaisa sat down opposite him.
‘So who the hell are you?’ Gerry said. His face was, she now saw, full of pimples and his arms looked thin and his chest caved in. Kaisa had thought he was older than her but, looking at him closely, she saw that he was just a youngster, perhaps 18 at the most.
‘Gerry, why don’t you and Lisa go and make sure the log pile is still covered up?’
Lyn said.
The purple-haired girl stood up and, taking Gerry by the hand, left the caravan. ‘Thanks for the food, that was a nice thing to do,’ Lisa said and gave Kaisa a quick hug. She smelled of a damp forest, and Kaisa wondered how the two of them would manage in the rain and wind wearing just thick jumpers. Didn’t they have any waterproof clothing here?
‘How have you been?’ Kaisa asked Lyn when the door had closed behind Gerry and Lisa, making the small caravan shudder again.
Lyn was holding onto her round belly. ‘I’m fine,’ she smiled. ‘Listen, don’t worry about Gerry. He’s not quite right, but he’s got nowhere else to go so we keep him here. And it’s better to have him on the demos; the police behave better when there’s a man with us.’ She was quiet for a moment and began pulling on the fluff covering her colourful poncho. ‘It’s strange how Gerry sort of scares the police. I think they see he’s a bit unpredictable.’
Kaisa’s mind was racing, ‘But he’s not dangerous?’
Lyn gave one of her easy, rippling laughs. It made Kaisa smile, although she was scared on her behalf. She was about to give birth to a baby and there was a madman on the premises. How did she sleep at night?
But instead of discussing Gerry, Lyn tilted her head and, looking at Kaisa with those green eyes of hers, asked, ‘Who are you, really?’
And so Kaisa began telling Lyn, this hippy girl everyone else she knew thought was wicked and crazy, her story; how she met Peter five years ago at the British Embassy cocktail party, and how even though she’d been engaged to be married to a Finnish man, she’d fallen head over heels for the Englishman. And how for four years they’d struggled to be together, writing letters, telephoning each other and, when they had the money, travelling back and forth to be with each other. Kaisa even told Lyn about the other girl Peter had fucked (yes, she used that word; inside that tiny caravan it seemed OK to use crude words like that), and about her one-night stand with the tennis player. Kaisa told Lyn about how her father had behaved, about his drunkenness, and his Jekyll-and-Hyde character. She told Lyn about her studies and how just when they were about to be married, she’d had doubts about tying her life with a man who served in the Armed Forces. And about how the Navy didn’t seem to want her either, branding Kaisa as a dangerous pro-Soviet woman. Lyn laughed at that.
Kaisa then told her about the job offer in London and even about Duncan, but not about his recent visit. That was too raw to talk about yet.
‘Wow, and how old are you?’ Lyn asked after Kaisa been speaking for a long time.
‘Twenty-four.’
‘Same age as me.’
While telling her tale, Kaisa had moved to sit next to Lyn on the sofa, and Lyn had made them some herbal tea. It tasted odd, a bit like hot water mixed with freshly cut grass, but it was warming and made Kaisa feel as if the caravan, and meeting the mad Gerry and Lisa, and talking like they were old friends with Lyn, was a dream.
‘How long until you’re due?’ Kaisa asked.
‘Oh, I think it’s about a month away.’
‘And will you go to hospital?’
Lyn laughed again, ‘No, Lisa is a midwife, that’s why she’s here.’
‘How many of you are there?’
‘Usually it’s about twenty-five, but everyone has gone home for Christmas. Except us, who have nowhere else to go.’
Kaisa was just about to ask why she had no home, when Lyn got up and said, ‘Listen, I need to lie down for a bit.’
Kaisa tried to ask her if she needed anything else, but she wouldn’t say.
‘See ya!’ she said and waved Kaisa off.
Twenty-Seven
In the week before Christmas, Kaisa spent a lot of time with Pammy. When her mother went back to London on Sunday, the 15th of December, Kaisa took over the caring for her friend. She’d met Pammy’s mother only fleetingly but, during that short time, she’d taken Kaisa to one side and made Kaisa promise that she wouldn’t leave her friend alone. They were virtually neighbours, so it was easy for Kaisa to keep an eye on her. Pammy had been prescribed bed rest for at least a fortnight, and told not to lift anything heavier than a bag of sugar. During one of her trips to Helensburgh to buy food and other supplies for Pammy and herself, Kaisa checked how much a bag of sugar weighed. This didn’t seem like much. When Kaisa told Pammy about the bag of sugar, she said, with a strangled voice, ‘Just as well I don’t have a child that I’d need to lift …’ She tried to laugh but began weeping instead. Kaisa hugged her and, although at first her shoulders tensed between Kaisa’s arms, eventually Pammy relaxed and let Kaisa comfort her. After a while she wiped her face with the handkerchief she seemed to be permanently clutching, and said, ‘I’m being silly. I really don’t know what the matter is with me this time.’
Even though she was so very sad about the baby, at times Kaisa seemed to be able to make Pammy laugh, mainly with her silly stories about Finland and her family, and about how Peter and she met. The more times Kaisa told the story, the more it became a tale outside herself. As if it had happened to someone else altogether. Pammy said she thought Kaisa should write a book about it, but she didn’t think she’d be able to do that. What language would she write in, for a start? Besides, what would Peter say if Kaisa told the world about their ‘love story’?
Every time Kaisa now went shopping, she made a habit of buying some bread, butter and chocolate for Lyn, too. She’d sit with her for a few minutes in the stuffy caravan, sometimes a little longer if Gerry wasn’t around. Kaisa still felt very wary of him, and worried for Lyn, but the pregnant girl seemed to be fond of the gangly teenager. Kaisa didn’t tell Pammy of her ‘second patient’, as Kaisa had begun to think of the two women. Although, she supposed, the two had really become her best friends. Even though their circumstances could not have been more different, they were actually quite alike, Kaisa thought, as she reversed her car out of the lay-by next to the camp. She hid her face in a hooded sweatshirt she’d taken to wearing, so as not to be recognised by anyone passing in a car. The camp was by the side of the road between Rhu, where the turning to the married quarters was, and the Faslane base, which meant most of the cars passing would be driven by people working for the Royal Navy, either locals at the dockyard or sailors and officers. But there was very little traffic, especially when the submarines were on patrol. Today, the road was deserted, and Kaisa breathed a sigh of relief.
As usual, it was a rainy day. Pammy had given Kaisa a key, and while Kaisa was putting the shopping into the cupboards, and into the almost empty fridge, Pammy came to sit on a kitchen chair. Pammy’s mother had made her soups and casseroles and had done a big shop just before leaving, but now the provisions were running low. Kaisa had brought Pammy a quiche and some limp lettuce she’d found at the small vegetable section in the shop. She’d also got some cabbage and some greens, because Kaisa believed Pammy needed to eat more vegetables to get better.
‘There’s some quiche for lunch, how about it?’
‘That’ll be nice. Can you stay?’ Pammy asked.
‘Yes, of course,’ said Kaisa.
‘You don’t have to you, you know,’ Pammy said.
Kaisa turned to face her from the sink, where she’d been washing the lettuce leaves. Pammy’s voice had sounded tearful again.
‘You’ve been really good to me, shopping for me and making food and keeping me company. But you must have things you need to do yourself?’
Kaisa looked at her friend. Her voice was strained and she was fiddling with a handkerchief, which she was folding into a small square. Kaisa couldn’t understand; had she offended Pammy in some way?
‘I have nothing else to do,’ Kaisa said simply.
‘That’s alright then,’ Pammy said, still in the same hurt voice.
‘What’s the matter?’ Kaisa went over to sit opposite Pammy at the small kitchen table. ‘We’re friends, aren’t we?’
‘Yes,’ Pammy said and got up. ‘Don’t mind me, I’m just a sad old girl feeling sorry for he
rself.’
Kaisa took hold of Pammy’s hands and gently pulled her back down. ‘Look, Peter is away, I don’t have a job, and I like being with you. What else would I do with my time? Since we’ve been friends, being here in Faslavatory hasn’t been so bad. Before you, I had no friends at all, and it was awful. I think I could have gone mad. During the first weeks in this place, I was seriously considering going back South on my own. I was dreading the time when Peter would have to go away. But then I met you and Phoebe and it’s been alright.’
Pammy looked at Kaisa with a sad smile on her face, and Kaisa feared she might start crying again, so she added, ‘And you showed me how to park in a multi-storey car park in Glasgow! What more could a girl possibly want?’
Pammy laughed and Kaisa got up and started preparing lunch again. As she was cutting up a piece of dried-up cucumber and a tomato with a wrinkly skin, Kaisa thought that what she was really doing here, and with Lyn at the camp, was running away from her own problems. Looking after Pammy and Lyn had given Kaisa a much-needed escape from her own thoughts and the rumour mill, which by now, if Phoebe was to be believed, was churning at full speed.
Time was also speeding ahead, in a way that it had never done when Peter had been away before. Christmas Eve was only four days away, and if Phoebe was to be believed, the boat would be coming home any time after the New Year.